Strawberry Jam Success

Today I made strawberry jam from the strawberries we picked on Saturday and it was a sweet success! I used this recipe on pickyourown.org. I bought the pectin and mason jars from the canning section at our local Wal-mart.

My little diaper clad helper

Fresh homemade strawberry jam courtesy of Amy and Abby the dynamic mother-daughter duo!

I know Jonathon, Abby and I can't go through all the jam I made so I plan on giving a jar to Ms. T, one to the neighbor across the street and one jar to the Anesthesia Resident lounge with some Hawaiian sweet rolls tomorrow for my fellow residents to have breakfast with!

Now it's way past my bed time! Good Night!

Strawberry Patch

I've been wanting to take Abby to a strawberry patch for a while now so I invited some of our family friends for a strawberry picking play date today! We went to Waller Family Farm right here in Durham. It is a cute little farm that has a really nice, pesticide free strawberry patch. I remember taking Ekata and Ehi to a strawberry patch in Houston a few years ago and dreaming about the day I would take my own daughter to one. Well that day has come and it was well worth the wait. Abby LOVED it! She loves fruits, particularly blueberries, cantaloupe and honey dew. Today we are adding strawberries to the list!

Abby loves collecting things so she was having a grand old time plucking strawberries and putting them in her little bucket. Then when she realized they were edible she downed all the strawberries in her bucket and then started to pluck strawberries off the vine and stuff them in her mouth as fast as she could, all while doing her "I'm so happy dance." It made my heart smile! Now it is time to try my hand at making homemade strawberry jam!

Our BFFs!

Duke Anesthesia was well represented today at the farm!

Duke Anesthesia Mommies and our Babies

LOVE this strawberry loving girl

Abby and her mama

Abby and her Papa

Abby, always dressed for the occasion. Her shoes and hair bow also had strawberries on them!

Birth Tourism

Through the years several Nigerian women have come to stay with my parents in Houston to give birth to their babies. Some of them were relatives some of them were family friends. They were all treated like family and they stayed with us free of charge. I did not realize there was a name for this phenomenon, birth tourism, and that it is becoming so popular that people are forming companies to cater to these women.

Apparently it is becoming more and more popular for Nigerian women to come to the States late in their pregnancy to have their baby and then return to Nigeria after the baby is born. While I was home this past weekend my cousin Ehis told me about a text message he received from an acquaintance asking him to advertise her business. Here is a copy of the message:

______ ______ introduces "BIRTH TOURISM"

We specialize in providing Housing, Medical and Transportation services for clients visiting the Houston, TX area for baby birth delivery. Our Service charge is a one time fee of 2500 USD for the following services:

*Airport Pick-up
*Month to month housing negotiations prepaid by client
*Negotiated Doctor and Hospital facility for safe delivery
*Transportation to Doctors visit prior and after delivery
8th Month (Twice a Month)
9th Month (Once a Week)
Post Delivery (As required by Doctor)
1-7th Month (Additional $50 per required visit)
*Assistance with baby American Passport & Nigerian Visa (Fees paid by client)
*Assistance with completion of baby SSN
*Assistance with obtaining notary for baby birth certificate in the absence of the father
*Twice a month Transportation/Assistance to Grocery/General Shopping. (Additional request is $30)
*Available assistance with knowledge
*Airport Drop-Off on Departure

Please note that the above services are well negotiated. We save you money on your medical bill due to our relationship with the hospital and save you on transportation since the Houston Area transportation system relies heavily on personal vehicle than public transport which attracts a heavy tariff. All you need to worry about is to make the 1st call to our contact office in Nigeria and we take care of you. We promise to ensure you have a memorable experience with us since we understand the need to feel comfortable.

Kindly rebroadcast so other expectant mothers can benefit from this opportunity.

Apparently this girl is making a lot of money. Financially well off Nigerians don't necessarily want to immigrate to the USA because they have comfortable lives in Nigeria, but they want to give their children the opportunities that American citizenship confers and are willing to pay a premium to do so. It is an interesting concept. I started doing some reading on it and learned that birth tourism is not illegal but there are congressmen who are trying to enact laws to stop birth right citizenship. In the meantime women from many countries besides Nigeria are taking advantage of the current citizenship laws. There are companies that cater to Chinese women, Indian women, Turkish women, etc. I also discovered that although the USA seems to be the most popular destination for birth tourism, people are starting to look to Canada to as a destination to have their baby.

And because no post is really complete without a picture here is a picture of Abby and her Big Uncle Ehis!

Abby is destined to be the flower girl at Ehis's future wedding to his sweet girlfriend Sayi!

Graduation Weekend 2013

This is a photo synopsis of Graduation Weekend 2013 featuring my two favorite Masters degree toting smarties. My line sister Sparkle and my little brother Ose!

Post call plane ride. If it weren't for mama Rose I would have collapsed from exhaustion since I hadn't slept in over 30 hours and Abby was full of toddler energy!

Dinner at Chuys with some fellow Nigerian mamas and our multiracial Nigerian babies!

Cousins enjoying a moment at the grocery store.

The newest Rice Masters of Liberal Studies Graduate. So proud of her!!!

The cousins and their Great Great Aunt Mama Rose

The siblings!

The fam!

Post Graduation dinner at Fogo de Chao

Our group of 20 Naija folks + 10 of my brothers friends ate way more than probably any other group in the house that night. We love some meat!

Abby and Grandpa

Now on to Mother's Day Festivities! Yay for my second mother's day as a mother!!

Cinco de Mayo

Despite the frigid very winter-like weather Durham has been having, the Mauritz household made the best of our weekend.

Saturday:

-Went to see Iron Man 3. Jonathon is a big fan of Iron Man and I am a good wife so we enjoyed a nice date to the movie theater!

-Made some awesome chili. The pioneer woman's recipes are always a hit with the hubby and baby.

-Picked up 18 potted daisy's from my mentors house and planted them in our front yard

Abby developing her green thumb and gardening with daddy.

 -Got Abby a new big girl car seat. The same one that her bff Olivia has. I love that she is now forward facing and I can see her precious face anytime I look in the rear view mirror!

Testing out her big girl car seat

-Spent 45 minutes at CVS getting Abby's passport photos done. It was a comedic catastrophe. After we finally got a decent photo the CVS employees invited us to the BBQ they were having in the parking lot. We all bonded over toddler passport pics!

Sunday:
-Went to church with Abby dressed in her Cinco de Mayo finest. Abby is almost 15 months old and super active so we moved her to the 16-24 month nursery and she loved it!

Cinco de Mayo 2013

What a difference a year makes. The pic above is Abby on Cinco de Mayo 2013 in her Mexican dress I got her in Cozumel, Mexico during Beth and Tony's wedding and below is Abby on Cinco de Mayo 2012 in her Mexican dress I got her in Cabo San Lucas, Mexico during Candice and Vince's wedding!

Cinco de Mayo 2012

-Made yummy chicken parmesan and a spaghetti vegetable medley.

-Went to visit Catherine and baby Samuel. He is a precious bundle of joy and she is a glowing new mama. Seeing that tiny sweet baby boy made my ovaries ache, but that quickly subsided when Abby got angry because I wouldn't let her play with their cat and smacked me in my face! We have got to work on her anger management...

Abby and Sammy, the beautiful start of a lifelong friendship!

Puerto Rico

This past weekend I was in San Juan, Puerto Rico for the Society of Obstetric Anesthesia and Perinatology conference. It was amazing. Both the conference and the location! Attending the conference reaffirmed my decision to pursue OB anesthesia as a career and it jump started my planning for upcoming mini summer vacations!

 

 

Liz, Claire and I with one of our OB Anesthesia Attendings, Dr Olufolabi  (he was also the anesthesiologist who put in my labor epidural!) at a great restaurant in Old San Juan called Barrachina, the birthplace of pina coladas!

The last time I was in Puerto Rico was for my 24th birthday celebration! Here I am with Kelli, Sparkle, Iro and Danielle after hiking through El Yunque!


At the end of May Jonathon and I are going to take Abby on her first trip to the zoo in Asheboro, NC and then down to Myrtle Beach, SC for her second trip to the beach. Her first beach trip was last June to Wrightsville Beach, NC.

At the end of June, Jonathon is going on a conference and while he is away Abby and I plan on cruising to the Bahamas with my siblings. I am still trying to work out the details. Fingers crossed everything pans out. In the meantime I have to go to CVS sometime this weekend to get Abby's passport picture done and then place her passport application in the mail!

Yay for summertime fun!!

Busy Bees

Today was an action packed day for the Mauritz family. We were out of the house by 7 am for our homeowners associations annual neighborhood wide yard sales. We went to about 8 yard sales in an hour and a half and racked up on some great stuff for unbelievably good prices! Jonathon got some yard tools and other man of the house type items, Mama Rose got bags and bags of clothing for her grand kids and great grand kids in Nigeria, I got some cute holiday door wreaths, and last but not least Abby got a ton of books, toys and a fabulous smocked dress originally purchased at a swanky children's boutique in Raleigh that must be worth $75 and I got it for 3 bucks!! Score!

By 9am we were in downtown Raleigh for the ALS walk. Jonathon's former boss has ALS and his whole office turned up to support him. ALS research is definitely a great cause for us to walk for!

By noon we were at Strickland Park also in Raleigh for my coworkers son's first birthday party. Abby as usual was dressed to the nines. I have so much fun dressing up my real life baby doll! Within seconds of arriving to the park Abby promptly destroyed her beautiful dress with strawberries, punch, cake, and green eggs and ham, but she had a blast doing it so I wasn't fazed.

After all those events we were so tired! We came home and had a nice afternoon siesta, then went outside to  work in the yard. Jonathon is starting to landscape our very neglected front yard and is doing a great job! We got a kiddie lawn mower at one of the yard sales earlier in the day and Abby occupied herself by pushing it around the yard and giggling to herself. It was precious.

Now Jonathon is giving Abby a bath and Mama Rose will put her to bed so Jonathon and I can have a movie night. Today was a good day!